


O Christmas Tree (Thy Leaves Are So Unchanging)

by Laine



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Fic Exchange, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-24
Updated: 2012-10-24
Packaged: 2017-11-16 23:44:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/545122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laine/pseuds/Laine
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's a very Lannister Christmas.  </p>
<p>Written for LJ's Game of Thrones Exchange.</p>
            </blockquote>





	O Christmas Tree (Thy Leaves Are So Unchanging)

“Does it ever snow in L.A., Mom?”  
  
Joanna flashes her ten-year-old son a bright smile as she passes him a box of tinsel (Tywin hates tinsel- too messy for his tastes- but Tyrion insisted). “Not that I’ve ever seen, and I’ve been here for almost twenty years.”  
  
Tyrion’s lower lip juts out in a slight pout, but he cheers up again when Joanna reaches into a shopping bag and pulls out a spray can of artificial snow. “So we’ll just have to make our own, won’t we?”  
  
The tiny boy gleefully spritzes every branch of the miniature pine tree until there’s hardly any green left. He rises up on tiptoe to reach the top section, and the chair he stands on wobbles a bit. Without thinking, Joanna rushes over and grabs Tyrion’s shoulders to steady him, and the child immediately narrows his eyes with pique; Tyrion likes to do everything for himself, and Joanna has to constantly work to keep her natural protectiveness in check.  
  
“It snowed in San Francisco, when we went to Uncle Kevan’s for Thanksgiving.” Tyrion drapes the tinsel over the snow-covered boughs and reaches for a box of candy canes. “And in Chicago, when we visited Auntie Genna last year. And in Aspen, when we went skiing with Uncle Stafford....”  
  
“Well then, perhaps I should tell them all not to come, and I’ll just pop you in a box and mail you to one of them, so you can spend Christmas in a snowy place.” Tyrion grimaces, then giggles, and Joanna reaches out to muss his already-messy white-blond hair.  
  
“How come I don’t hear Christmas music? Didn’t we agree that there should always be Christmas carols playing in this house from Thanksgiving til New Year’s?”  
  
“I had them on before, while you were out shopping. But then Dad turned them off...”  
  
“Tywin,” Joanna calls, her voice echoing brightly; in spite of the mansion’s enormous size, she knows that her husband will hear. “Stop being a Grinch.”  
  
And sure enough, Tywin enters the room moments later, his face drawn in a deep frown. Tyrion stops decorating the tree, his muscles tense and eyes wary, but Joanna calmly crosses to Tywin and smiles up at him, rubbing her hands up and down his arms.  
“Cheer up, Scrooge,” she says, glancing over his shoulder at her son. “Tyrion, go put on some Bing Crosby.”  
  
After Tyrion heads down the hall en route to the sound system, Joanna steps closer to her husband and wraps her arms around his waist, holding him close. “Are you all right?” she asks as she presses her ear to his quickly-beating heart.  
  
“Never better,” he replies, and she’s relieved to hear the snap of determination in his tone. He’ll put on a brave face for the family, and this messiness will pass before they know it- Tywin always teases her for her cock-eyed optimism, but Joanna intends to put it to good use this weekend. She raises herself up on tiptoe and kisses him softly, parting only after she feels the corners of his lips curve up into a smile.  
  
  
.  
  
Cersei Lannister feels her phone vibrate in her lap, but she very pointedly refrains from looking at the screen. Robert hasn’t returned any of her texts for three days, and there’s no need for her to jump to respond just because he finally feels like reaching out. Even if he is texting to apologize, which she doubts…he can wait.  
  
They had a terrible fight before the end of semester, which culminated in Robert calling Cersei a string of epithets that would cost him his life, were her brother around to hear. Among other things, he dubbed her a “spoiled, insensitive cunt”, and she retaliated by telling him how embarrassed and ashamed she’d been to call herself his girlfriend after he made that huge fumble during the last football game of the season. He clenched his fists, and she thought for a moment that he might hit her- but then he was gone, stalking down the hall and whipping his phone out to text his stupid friend, Ned.  
  
All of this is Ned’s fault, anyway. Robert had already promised to go with Cersei to the sorority-fraternity holiday ball; she’d just finished rushing the most exclusive sorority on campus, and she couldn’t wait to walk into that party draped in couture, her hair and makeup perfectly styled, showing those bitches what it meant to have a Lannister in their midst. And although he may have terrible manners and be a sloppy drunk, Robert is an upperclassman and the star of the football team (the occasional fumble aside, he plays very well; it’s likely that he’ll be drafted into the NFL after graduation). He’d make the perfect date for her debut.  
  
But then, Ned Stark called and invited Robert to an impromptu memorial service for his sister Lyanna, who died two years ago just before Christmas. She’d been Robert’s girlfriend before Cersei, and they were apparently talking about getting married after they graduated- but then she had the accident. At first, Cersei had been intrigued by Robert’s past with Lyanna; she knows now how stupid it was, but she somehow thought that going through something so emotional would make Robert a deeper and more complex person. Only later did she realize the extent of his continued fixation with his dead girlfriend- it’s creepy, nearly bordering on obsession. And as soon as he got that call from Ned, he booked a flight up to Canada and didn’t even bother to tell Cersei until the morning before he left.  
  
If this was high school, she would likely have shrugged it off and brought Jaime along as her date. But Jaime goes to school in California, miles and miles away from her- and besides, bringing her twin brother to an event like this would just make her look pathetic. These people wouldn’t understand about Jaime (not that anyone could ever understand about Jaime).  
  
She steps off of the small plane (private, of course; Father always sends a private plane for his little princess), and her scowl of annoyance immediately transforms into a broad grin at the sight of the cherry-red Lamborghini stopped nearby.  
  
Jaime mirrors her smile bac k to her as he leans against the car and waits for her to approach. His hair is windblown (he’d obviously been driving with the top down) and he wears a leather jacket; were it anyone else, she would roll her eyes at the combination of the jacket and the car and the devil-may-care attitude. But it’s Jaime, and it all suits him impossibly well.  
  
“Does Mom know you took that car out?” she asks as the flight attendant puts her bags in the Lamborghini’s tiny trunk.  
  
“She’s been out shopping with Tyrion all day. She doesn’t even know I’m here; she thinks one of the drivers came to pick you up.”  
  
That doesn’t surprise Cersei; their mother tries to prevent them from being alone together as much as possible.  
  
They stand opposite each other for a moment, green eyes meeting green eyes, a current of sparking energy passing back and forth- and then Cersei launches herself into her brother’s arms and holds as tight as she can. They haven’t been apart for very long- they saw each other at Thanksgiving- but any time she spends away from Jaime feels like an eternity.  
  
After they climb into the car, Jaime shifts gears and drives toward a dark stretch of road. Cersei keeps her hand over his on the gear; she thinks she feels him trembling.  
  
He pulls over and parks- and then there’s the stillness, the pregnant pause that always appears between them, the tension that began years ago and has yet to disappear. She thinks of that early summer evening all the time- they were swimming together at the beach in Hyannisport, innocent as always…until playful splashing and wrestling turned to deliberate touches and breathless kisses. When Mother saw what they were doing, she sent them to opposite wings of the house, and then off to separate sleep-away camps a week later.  
  
Yes, she thinks of it all the time- and she knows that Jaime does, too.  
  
He reaches for her again, and they melt into another embrace; her heart swells until she nearly feels like crying-  _I’ve missed you so much, I’m not complete without you._  
  
“I got you something,” Jaime whispers in her ear. “I mean, I got you a few things, obviously…but I want you to have this one before we have to go be with everybody.”  
  
He slips his hand into the pocket of his jacket and pulls out a tiny box, neatly wrapped. A sudden jolt of jealousy shakes her; did he have the shopkeeper do that, or does her naturally-messy brother have a little girlfriend to help him with these things? But she shakes the thought away as she peels away the wrapping and opens the box.  
  
It’s a necklace, a plain silver chain with a sea-glass pendant. For a moment, she’s confused- it’s not her style at all, and Jaime knows that very well. But the glass does look familiar…she peers at it for a while longer, and her breath catches in her throat when she understands.  
  
“You got this in Hyannisport?” The family hadn’t been back to their East Coast vacation house since that fateful summer. But she remembers combing the beach with Jaime, looking for pretty pieces of glass and keeping them in vases around the house.  
  
He nods, taking the necklace from her and draping it around her neck, his nimble fingers quick with the clasp. “It goes with your eyes.”  
  
Cersei closes her hand over the piece of glass as the memories scroll through her brain like a slide show. She reaches up to push a lick of golden hair behind Jaime’s ear before pressing a light kiss to the skin at the side of his mouth, right over his dimple.  
  
“I love it.”  _I love you._  
  
.  
  
Even before he opens his eyes, Tywin feels the migraine building between his temples. He knows better than to tell Joanna; she’d just tell him to take an aspirin, but Tywin Lannister has no use for pharmaceuticals- never has, never will. It will go away on its own…it has to.  
  
He reaches for the bedside table and picks up his Blackberry, wincing at the sight of a full inbox. The e-mails surely contain more tedious questions, more requests for interviews; everyone wants to know why Lannister Corp and Targaryen Industries have parted ways so suddenly, and just before the holidays. The split cost the companies millions of dollars and thousands of job- the world demands a reason. And somehow, Tywin doubts that “Aerys Targaryen is a lunatic” will make for a compelling sound bite.  
  
With a yawning groan, he turns on his side and finds Joanna already awake, her hands folded under her cheek as she stares at him. Before he has a chance to ask how long she’s been up, his wife leans over and kisses him deeply, raking her manicured nails through his thinning hair.  
  
“Merry Christmas, darling,” she murmurs in a sing-song melody; she loves that ridiculous Carpenters tune.  
  
And in that moment, Tywin resolves that he will keep the day as pleasant as possible. Kevan will ask about the company split, of course- and probably Genna, too. But he’ll make It clear to both of them that it’s a topic for another time; nothing will ruin this holiday. Nothing will ruin his Joanna’s favorite day of the year.  
  
“Ugh, I’ve already overslept- I need to get down to the kitchen,” Joanna says as she slides from the bed and into a pair of mink and cashmere slippers.  
“I still can’t believe you gave the staff the day off,” Tywin replies with more steel in his tone than he’d like; if they had the cooks and the maids there, the family party would surely go more smoothly. The thought of the hectic, haphazard morning to come intensifies his migraine and stiffens his muscles- he’d seen a doctor once who dared to suggest that he go on medication for OCD, and Tywin had responded by calling his friends on the Medical Board of California and getting the fool’s license revoked.  
  
“It’s Christmas Eve, Tywin. They should be with their families. Besides, I like to cook for holidays. And I’ll have Tyrion to help me, and Dorna and Cersei and Genna…”  
  
Tywin offers Joanna a skeptical lift of his brows; the last time his sister had tried to cook anything, she nearly set their father’s house on fire. Of course, that likely wouldn’t stop her from sitting at the kitchen island with a goblet of wine and criticizing the way Kevan’s wife braids her pie crust. And as for Cersei…the idea of her helping in the kitchen is more laughable still.  
  
“Oh, that reminds me…your sister called last night. She’ll probably be late; some emergency with her house manager or dog sitter or something. Anyway, we’ll have to push dinner back at least a half an hour.”  
  
Tywin leans against the headboard and presses his eyes into the heels of his hands. “But then the tree decorating will be off schedule, and the neighborhood carolers will probably show up during dinner-“  
  
He pauses when Joanna takes his face between her hands and presses her cool brow to his. “It’s going to be all right. It’s the holidays- things are supposed to get off-schedule. That’s part of the fun.”  
  
He wants to wrap his arms around her and draw her back down onto the bed, but she steps away and disappears into her dressing room. When she comes out, she hands him something folded and woolly.  
  
“I got this for you to wear today.”  
  
Tywin twists his lips into a grimace as he beholds the dark-green sweater with an intricately-woven reindeer at the center. “I can’t wear this,” he clips, pushing it aside; he feels his cheeks beginning to flush with an anger that he knows to be irrational. “I’ll look foolish.”  
  
“It’s our family. There’s no need to worry about looking foolish around family.” She retreats back to the closet-room, calling out, “Besides, you won’t be alone.”  
  
Joanna steps back into the bedroom wearing nothing but her lace underwear, her slippers, and a fuzzy blue sweater emblazoned with a huge snowman. “There, now. I don’t look foolish, do I?”  
  
Tywin says nothing. He only rises and crosses to her, lifting her off of the floor and laying her down on the bed, sweater and all. This is all throwing their schedule even farther into ruin, but he finds that he couldn’t care less.  
  
.  
  
“It’s Uncle Ger! Come on, Jaime!”  
  
Tyrion grabs his brother’s hand and drags him outside to stand in the rotary. Uncle Gerion drives his Range Rover up and pulls his window down; he grew a beard while he was in Australia, and it nearly covers the crazy sunburns staining his cheerful face.  
  
“Hey, guys. Long time no see.”  
  
“What did you bring me, Uncle Ger?” Tyrion bounces up and down on his heels, and Jaime laughs.  
  
“Geez, Tyrion, spoiled much? How ‘bout ‘Hi, Uncle Ger! How was Australia?’” Jaime punctuates his sentence by giving his brother a good-natured punch on the arm.  
  
“Normally, I’d agree with Jaime,” Uncle Gerion replies lackadaisically, his eyes twinkling with mischief. “But in this case, you’re right to be impatient. This gift is ridiculously awesome.”  
  
“Can I have it now, Uncle Ger? Please?”  
  
“Well, since you asked nicely.” Uncle Gerion parks his Range Rover and steps out, walking around to open the trunk. “Now, remember a few years ago, when I asked you what gift you wanted most in the world?”  
  
Tyrion’s face splits into an enormous smile, which only grows wider when Gerion opens the trunk to reveal an enormous lizard in a cage.  
  
“What is that?” Jaime asks.  
  
“It’s a komodo dragon,” Tyrion answers, eyes wide with wonder as he looks back and forth between the the lizard and his uncle. “You got me a dragon.”  
  
As it turns out, the dragon is just the beginning; this turns out to be the best Christmas Tyrion can ever remember having. Uncle Tyg got him a whole box of video games, Uncle Kevan gave him that chemistry set he wanted, and Auntie Genna got him the newest Kindle. And Mom let him eat all the cake and meringue cookies he wanted, and she made Dad stay out of the kitchen (which made his usual micromanaging impossible).  
  
Tyrion steps out into the front parlor, where Cersei and Genna are splitting their third bottle of wine. Both of them look pretty sleepy; Cersei’s struggling to keep her eyes open, and Auntie Genna stumbles through a monologue about how fat and lazy her kids are getting. Jaime perches on the arm of Cersei’s chair, and he starts whispering something to her- she hits him on the shoulder, then they start a poking fight, which escalates to a tickle fight. But then Mom comes in and glares at them, and they stop.  
  
Before they all sit down for dinner, Uncle Tyg proposes a pick-up football game. Even Dad and Uncle Kevan, who’ve been holed up in the den all day, agree to play. Tyrion worries that he’ll have to sit off on the sidelines with Cousin Cleos, like usual- but then Jaime picks him up and puts him on his shoulders. As he flies down the field, his hands holding tight to Jaime’s golden hair, with a dragon waiting in the house for him and all of his favorite foods on the dinner table, Tyrion thinks that he’s never been so happy in all his life.  
  
.  
  
Jaime lies on his back and stares up through the branches of the Christmas tree; green pine and shiny decorations and twinkling lights. He takes a deep inhale, hoping that the scent of fir might calm the twisting of his stomach. No such luck.  
  
He isn’t a pensive or anxious person by nature, and the unfamiliarity of these emotions annoys him more than anything else. And to have all of this happen right before the holidays, too…  
  
He’d been really confused and secretly excited to get the call from Arthur Dayne, Targaryen Industries’ lead corporate recruiter. He had met Dayne , while interning at Lannister Corp during his first semester, and it only took a few minutes of conversation to convince Jaime that this guy was the smartest, most interesting and most admirable person he’d ever met. But once Dad ended the alliance between the two companies, Jaime was sure that he’d never hear from anyone at Targaryen again-  
  
Dayne offered him an internship at the Targaryen offices in New York for the next semester, claiming that Aerys Targaryen had personally asked Dayne to extend the invitation to Jaime. The whole thing made no sense, considering that Aerys Targaryen and Dad were on horrible terms. Jaime’s immediate reaction was to refuse; he couldn’t work for his dad’s rival company. When Dayne started giving him the hard sell, telling him about all of the opportunities that would become available to him after working in a position like this, Jaime rather bluntly explained that he didn’t  _need_  those opportunities. He’s Tywin Lannister’s son- he doesn’t  _have_  to work, he doesn’t  _have_  to do anything.  
  
And then Dayne said something that Jaime will never forget: “You’re better than that, Jaime. Yeah, you could spend your life living off of Daddy’s dime- nepotism is alive and well in the corporate world. But someone like you, with all the talent and potential in the world…don’t just take the easy route. You owe it to yourself.”  
  
Even now, the recollection of those words brings a proud flush to his cheeks-  _Arthur Dayne thinks I’m talented_. And maybe he’s right, maybe Jaime should seek out opportunities beyond the ones he gets just for being a Lannister. Plus, if he spent a semester in New York, he’d be close to Cersei…  
  
“We used to sleep under the tree all the time when I was little.” Startled, Jaime sits up quickly, but he relaxes his muscles when he recognizes his baby brother’s silhouette in the doorway.  
  
“Yeah, I remember. And I used to read Christmas stories to you.”  
  
“I can read  _you_  a Christmas story,” Tyrion says, waving his new Kindle in Jaime’s direction. “I just bought  _A Christmas Carol_.”  
  
“Yeah, okay.” Jaime slides over to make room for Tyrion. The little boy flops down on the tree skirt and snuggles close to Jaime, who closes his eyes as his brother begins to read.  
  
Tyrion doesn’t make it any farther than the first chapter before he falls asleep; Jaime reaches over to turn off the Kindle, then grabs an afghan from the couch to cover Tyrion. He settles back down and stares back up through the tree branches- he hates having to make decisions, he’s so used to having the hard choices made for him-  
  
She tiptoes into the room, but Jaime can sense Cersei’s presence all the same. She stands in front of the tree for a moment, and Jaime swallows hard; she’s wearing just a thin tank-top and a pair of his boxer shorts, the red ones with the gold lion pattern. She twists her lips an d glowers at Tyrion’s sleeping form. “What are you doing?”  
  
“He was reading me a bedtime story.” Jaime pats the floor on his other side. “Come here.”  
  
She hesitates, still glaring at Tyrion, but then she approaches and lies next to him. They’re silent for a while, but then Cersei scoots closer and rests her head on his shoulder. “I’ve missed you so much.”  
  
And in that moment, Jaime wants nothing more than to tell her that he’s accepting the Targaryen internship, that he’ll be in New York with her for an entire semester. But he’s not ready to say those words quite yet; saying it makes it real, after all. So he says nothing. Instead, he rolls on his side and puts his arms around his sister’s waist, pulling her close until he can bury his face in her sweet-smelling hair.  
  
“Jaime, stop it…what if Mom wakes up-“  
  
“I don’t care.” He hugs her tight, probably tight enough to hurt, but it’s not enough- it’s never been enough. He can’t get as close to her as he wants, but if this is the next best thing, he’ll take it.  
  
And she doesn’t resist. She just presses her back into him and breathes deeply- he can feel each inhale and exhale, each contraction of her lungs. He closes his eyes, his nostrils filling with the scent of her lemon-and-rose shampoo, and he feels at peace in a way that he hasn’t known in days, weeks, months…in a way he never knows unless the two of them are together.  
.  
  
Joanna wakes up right after dawn and tiptoes downstairs to the kitchen. On the way, she passes the big front room where the tree is kept, and a scalding heat boils her blood at the sight of Jaime and Cersei lying together, legs entangled, faces close. She nearly stomps over and screams them awake- but Tyrion’s there, so it can’t be anything but innocent…and perhaps she’s always been a bit too sensitive about the twins’ closeness…and it is Christmas, after all.  
  
She lets them be.  
  
When she reaches the kitchen, she preheats the oven and removes the chilled dough from the refrigerator; she’s making the cinnamon rolls that Jaime and Cersei like so much. She starts the coffeemaker and cuts some fruit- all the little domestic tasks that she only performs when the staff is away.  
  
And then, when all that is done, she slips into one of the pantries and closes the door before reaching into her robe pocket to retrieve her phone. A secret ritual, something that she only does in the early mornings when no one can see or hear.  
  
She listens to the voicemails, ten in a row, all saying the same thing with escalating degrees of urgency: “Mrs. Lannister, this is Doctor Pycelle from the oncology center. Please call me as soon as you receive this message to discuss your test results.”  
  
As usual, the lump forms in her throat, the flush in her cheeks, the tremble in her hands. She hasn’t returned the calls yet, and they started over a week ago- but she knows what they’re going to say. And she knows that if she never makes herself available to hear the words, then it won’t ever begin to seem real. It won’t ever be something she has to reveal to her husband and family…she’ll just ignore it until it disappears in earnest.  
  
Joanna Lannister is not a stupid woman. She knows that this reaction is absurdly childish and self-defeating, and a part of her hopes that she will come to her senses next week and call the doctor back. But today is Christmas, her very favorite holiday, and all of her beautiful golden children are home and it’s a glorious sunny day-  
  
She can feel the tears burning in her eyes, but she swallows hard until they vanish.  _There’s no crying on Christmas._  
  



End file.
